Secondaries
Secondaries come in all shapes and sizes. Some schools have big long lengthy sections, others have a few quick questions. Be sure to save anything you submit (which is usually online now), as other schools are likely going to ask you similar questions and you can make it work, a la Tim Gunn.

The key in secondaries is to give schools something new about you, or something that you just touched on but would like to develop further (often the former is easier to do based on the question). Like I said before, the faster your turnaround on the secondaries, the faster you can hear back about an interview usually. I think I gave myself maybe a week per secondary–but again, did a ton of editing in that week. Here are some examples (looking back, I’ve found typos and grammar errors that I must’ve included–ack!):

Note, I also went back and updated my personal statement to include a couple drafts I went through with that one, too. Thought that might be helpful to see how they’ve changed.

Interviewing
Congrats! You’ve got an interview! You’re most of the way there. My feeling on interviews is this: you’re certainly a potential admit at this point. Now you just need to prove to them that your awesomeness on paper is equal to your awesomeness in person. Smile, be social, be friendly, be polite, be humble, and be yourself. (Some of that may be conflicting, of course.) Be someone you would want to be classmates with–because that’s how your student interviewer will be evaluating you partially.

But also be prepared. Here’s an insanely long list of interview questions I compiled. Certainly no need to prepare yourself to that degree, but give the list to a friend, and have him or her ask you questions for half an hour. It’ll do wonders for making your first interview easier–it’s one thing to review the questions on your own and think you know the answers, but another entirely to be able to say them and explain them aloud.

Being prepared also means coming in with a list of your own questions. Show you’ve done your research. They want to know why you want to go to their school, why you’d be a good fit for their program. They already know for the most part that you want to go to A medical school. Right before the interview day, I went to the school’s website, jotted down facts about the school, things unique to the school, other things I might be interested in (the school’s free clinic opportunities, opportunity to get an MPH, etc) and brought it with me on interview day. I also made a list of questions based on those facts, and brought a copy of my personal statement and the secondaries to the school, so they’d be fresh in my mind if anyone asked about them.

Interviews are the time to toot your own horn. Now is not the time to be modest. But be humble. There’s certainly a fine line between bragging and arguing for yourself, but your goal at the end of the interview day is to make them think, “Wow, we would be silly not to accept this person!” I go into interviews with two things in mind:

1) I have an agenda, and that is to let the interviewer know certain key things about me that are impressive, unique, or important about who I am and what I will bring (and I will make sure that I get those things across, somehow incorporating them into an answer)
2) I am there to argue my case and convince the interviewer that he or she should be fighting for me–that it would be their loss–and a huge one–not to accept me.

Second Looks
Congrats! You got an acceptance or ten! Now it’s time to decide where to go. It’s the same thing you’ll hear anywhere–go with your gut. Go with the feeling you get on the interview day. Do the people seem genuinely happy? Could you see yourself walking around there? Learning there? Will there be things to do there in your free time? You can make a “pros” and “cons” list, but in the end, I think it boils down to the feel and the location.

But if you’re not sure, or if you can’t remember everything, go do a second look. Most schools offer them. I actually didn’t have a great awesome interview day at Stanford (where I currently am). I really wanted to like it, but I didn’t as much as other schools. I ran into a couple Stanford students at an AMSA convention, who basically said I’d be stupid not to go there if I got in. So I did a second look at Stanford, and I was sold. Not because of the great things the administrators said about the place, but because of the people I met as my future classmates. Second looks may try to wow you with financial aid numbers, or class skits, or parties with free alcohol, but go to them to see who your new classmates might be. That should be what sells you. They’ll be some of the most important people in your life for the next 4 years.

Final Advice
All things being equal, go to a pass/fail school. I think it eliminates a lot of competition from the get-go, and weeds out and disables any would-be gunners or gunner-like behavior.

Comments

What IS “gunner-like” behavior? My school is Honors/Pass/Fail and there were only three things that I found annoying about it: 1) An 89 was valued the same as a 70, 2) there was a lot of whining to course directors about specific “unfair” exam questions, and 3) a few people in the class were smug about their grades (and looked down on those who didn’t get honors on everything). Is that what you’re referring to? I didn’t see any sabotage or anything like that….

I do think having the honors carrot made me study harder, but that is just me.

Tim:

Thanks for this series. It’s a great help.

LadyGrey:

I’m at an honors/high pass/pass/low pass/fail school, which might as well be A/B/C/D/F. Except that in the letter system, you get pluses and minuses. Our system gives you weird disincentives — if you know there’s no mathematical way you’re going to get honors at that point in the term (90 and up), why work your butt off to get the 89? You’ll get a high pass just the same if you get an 80.

I’ve heard of some nasty behavior in classmates in clinical rotations, but nothing too awful in the first two years, so I don’t think grades automatically lead to evil.

?:

Do people at schools that aren’t pass/fail still email out notes to share with the whole class? If there was one good thing about my school I think it was the pass/fail first two years…

“They want to know why you want to go to their school, why you’d be a good fit for their program. They already know for the most part that you want to go to A medical school.”
Years ago, when I was applying to med school, this was the part of the interview/secondary application that I hated the most. As a Californian, I preferred to stay in California. Like most California medical school applicants, I had to lie to the out of state schools and pretend like I wanted to go to their medical school. I was accepted at several out of state schools- and I was happy because my primary goal was to go to “A medical school”

Maybe it’s just me, but I really like the H/NH/P/F system at my school. The difference in work required to pass a class and Honor a class is enormous… honestly it’s just not that hard to pass.

But for me I need that motivation, otherwise I’d be watching every single NBA/NCAA/NFL game and going off all day long. I need that carrot dangling in front of me to keep me learning stuff well to prep for boards. I understand that preclinical grades are worthless and I don’t stress about them. I don’t know why people get so worked up about it when they are told up front preclinical grades don’t matter (unless you’re desparate for AOA)

People are still friendly enough. The people dumb enough to turn competitive because of a grading system aren’t worth knowing anyway. And we’ve had notes sent out over email lists, but who actually wants MORE shoddy poorly organized material to look through? It only helps if you make the notes.

…

One thing I wish I had been told as an interviewee is that if you’re asked “do you know what you want to go into?”, never be honest and say you don’t know. Say whatever specialty fits your personality/application best. During admissions committee meetings someone who _appears_ to be passionate about a particular specialty who shows they’ve looked into many different fields while still keeping an open mind sounds much more impressive than “Joe doesn’t yet know what he wants to go into.”

Lauren:

I just wanted to let you know that this is an awesome post, and I’m really glad I found your blog! It’s full of humor and good advice!

Jade:

Thanks for this post, today I started freaking out about whether I have a solid plan for getting into med school or not, and this helped ease my fears a little… though I wonder if I should take a MCAT course or something

Welcome!

This is a medical weblog--a collection of thoughts about medicine, medical training, and health policy--written by a fifth-year medical student.

I recently stopped blogging, as I graduated from medical school and I'm now a physician in my residency training in New York City. But feel free to read and enjoy!